The present application is a National Phase Entry of PCT International Application No. PCT/US2015/010921, which was filed on Jan. 9, 2015, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
A continuous product, as used herein, refers to a product, such as a sheet, strip, or wire, that is manufactured using a continuous production system. For example, during the manufacture of a continuous product, a continuous material may be provided from a cylinder (e.g., a spool or reel) and may proceed through any number of inline manufacturing steps, one directly after another, such that the output of one step serves as the input to the following step, until the continuous product is fully formed and packaged. It is not uncommon for one or more of these manufacturing steps to inadvertently or intentionally impart organics to the surface of the continuous product. These contaminates may include, for example, temporary coatings, lubricants, and other organic compounds. It may be desirable to remove these organic contaminates to avoid contamination between manufacturing steps or before the product is packaged to improve the appearance and usability of the continuous product.
One method of removing these organic contaminants from the surface of a continuous product involves using organic solvents (e.g., fluorocarbons) to dissolve and wash these contaminates from the surface of the product. However, using organic solvents to clean the surface of the product has several disadvantages. For example, these disadvantages include the amount of cleaning time required as well as the additional cost and equipment associated with managing organic solvent fumes and/or recycling the organic solvent.
Another method of removing these organic contaminants from the surface of a continuous product involves batch thermal treatment of the continuous product as an intermediate process after production and prior to packaging. For this method, the continuous product may be loaded onto a temporary holder (e.g., cylinder, bobbin, or reel) then placed within a furnace to heat the product to a sufficient temperature to remove the organic contaminates from the surface. However, this method also has several disadvantages, including the additional time, cost, and equipment associated with: loading the continuous product onto the temporary holder, transporting the product to the furnace, heating the furnace to a suitable temperature to remove the organic contaminates, allowing the product to cool, removing the product from the furnace, and then transferring the continuous product from the temporary holder to another holder (e.g., cylinder, bobbin, or reel) for packaging. Additionally, this method consumes a substantial amount of energy, in the form of electricity and/or fuel, to heat the entire interior of the furnace to a suitable temperature to remove the organic contaminates from the surface of the continuous product. Furthermore, since the continuous product is loaded onto the temporary holder before being loaded in the furnace, the outer portions of the product will not heat up at the same rate as the portions of the product disposed beneath, closer to the temporary holder. As such, this method does not allow for uniform, controlled heating of the continuous product.